DVD Release Date: June 21, 2005 (Sony Pictures Home Entertainment)
B&W/Color
MSRP: $39.95
Number of Discs: 4
Number of Episodes: 36
Running Time: 917 minutes
Total Run Time of Special Features: 25 minutes
Languages, Subtitles, Closed Captioning: Both sets
Closed-Captioned; Colorized set includes Spanish and Portuguese
languages as well as Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, and
Thai subtitles.
Special Features: "The Magic Unveiled" Featurette
(interviews); "Magic and Mishaps" (technical errors
from the show); Full-length trailer from the 2005 film
version of Bewitched

Introduction:

Much to the delight of the many fans out there, Sony
Pictures Home Entertainment has taken the initiative
to release the Complete First Season of Bewitched. And
to sweeten the pot, they have given consumers a
choice--original black and white copies of the
episodes or color versions of the episodes. In the
first season of Bewitched, we get to see Samantha and
Darrin get married and we get to meet most of the main
characters from the show. Although the show was always
wacky and bizarre with its characters and situations,
the first season is probably one of the least bizarre,
and has a greater focus upon the relationship between
the newlyweds, Samantha and Darrin.

Memorable Episodes / Notable Guest Stars:

The first season of Bewitched begins with "I, Darrin,
Take this Witch, Samantha," the episode that starts it
all. In this episode, we find Samantha and Darrin on
their honeymoon, only for Darrin to discover
that--SURPRISE!--his wife is a witch! She promises to
stop using witchcraft, but how long will that last? We
get to meet the snooping neighbor Gladys Kravitz in
"Be It Ever So Mortgaged," the episode where Darrin
and Samantha move to their home where they live for
the next eight seasons on Morning Glory Circle. June
Lockhart, as well as Jimmy Mathers (brother of Jerry
Mathers) makes a special appearance in "Little
Pitchers Have Big Fears," an episode where Samantha
uses her powers to give a 10-year-old boy a confidence
boost. Maurice Evans makes his first appearance as
Samantha's father in "Just One Happy Family," where he
is appalled to learn that his daughter has married a
mortal. We learn that Louise and Larry Tate are
expecting an addition to the family in "...And
Something Makes Three," an episode in which Maureen
McCormick makes an appearance. Darrin tries to keep a
friend named Kermit (played by Adam West) from
marrying a woman that he believes is a witch in "Love
is Blind." Bill Daily and Bill Mumy make an appearance
as Samantha takes Darrin and an orphan that doesn't
believe in Santa on a trip to the North Pole in "A
Vision of Sugar Plums." Samantha gives Darrin magical
powers after he breaks his ankle and quickly regrets
it in "A is for Aardvark." Vic Tayback makes a cameo
appearance in "Red Light, Green Light." Samantha
refuses to use her witchcraft to open the garage door
after she and Darrin get stuck inside because of a
wiring mistake in "Open the Door, Witchcraft." When
Mrs. Kravitz catches Samantha using witchcraft to
straighten a picture, Samantha makes Mrs. Kravitz
believe that she has ESP—and makes life miserable for
Abner--in "Abner Kadabra." Samantha and
Endora use witchcraft to advertise a failing Italian
restaurant, and potentially cause Darrin to lose an
account with a pizza restaurant, in "Eat at Mario's."

Packaging:

The packaging for this set is very clean, adequate,
and compact; Sony has taken the slim case design and
made the set as compact as possible.
In fact, this set is no larger than an Amaray case,
yet it is still able to include four discs in a
convenient fashion. What this set does is uses slim
cases that can hold two discs each. One disc is
contained on one side of the case n the other disc is
on the other side--there is no overlapping at all. On
the front of each slim case, there are pictures of
Samantha, Endora, and Darrin (slightly different than
the pictures on the cover of the box). On the back of
each case, there is a listing of all of the episodes
on the discs contained inside as well as a brief
description of those episodes. The only complaint I
have about the cases themselves is the fact that they
do not seem to really lock the discs in place. Almost
every time that I opened up a case, at least one disc
would fall out of the holder. If you aren't too
careful with the discs, this is an easy way to scratch
the disc. The outside box is nothing out of the
ordinary. It is basically just a blue box that
contains pictures of Samantha, Endora, and Darrin on
the front, and talks about the show on the back of the
box.

The art contained on the discs is simple, with the
city skyline in the background and pictures of
different characters on each disc. Disc 1 has a
picture of Samantha, Disc 2 has a picture of Darrin,
and Disc 4 has a picture of Endora. That only leaves
Disc 3, which has a picture of Paul Lynde--something
that I found to be very strange. Most Bewitched fans
remember Paul Lynde in his role as Uncle Arthur in the
series, but Uncle Arthur never even appeared in the
first season! Paul Lynde did make an appearance in the
episode "Driving is the Only Way to Fly," but that
minor role hardly justifies putting his picture on the
disc art. Even if this set DID include episodes with
Uncle Arthur, he was never a major character by any
means, and it would have been much more appropriate to
include Larry Tate or Mrs. Kravitz. Disc 1 contain
episodes 1-9, Disc 2 contains episodes 10-18, Disc 3
contains episodes 19-27, and Disc 4 contains episodes
28-36.

Menu Design and Navigation:

The menus are pretty simple, but this set also shows
that a simple menu can also be creative. Once you
insert the DVD and get past the
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment logo, a Bewitched
logo comes up, and we quickly see an animated Samantha
twitching her nose. What happens next is SLIGHTLY
different on each disc, but soon afterwards, an
animated Samantha and Darrin show up in the kitchen,
where Samantha is holding a frying pan that has the
options inside the smoke. In the colorized set, the
options that come up are Play All Episodes, Episode
Selections, and Languages (only on the "In Color"
set). Additionally, Disc 1 contains "The Magic
Unveiled: Part 1," Disc 2 contains "The Magic
Unveiled: Part 2," Disc 3 contains "Magic and
Mishaps," and Disc 4 contains a Previews option. The
Episode Selections option takes you to a simple menu
where you can choose the episode you want to see
(pictures from the episodes are shown in what appears
to be picture frames on a wall). Languages (which is
available only on the "In Color" set) allows you to
select what Audio and Subtitles you want.

Video and Audio Quality:

Since there are two different sets, the video and
audio quality isn't precisely the same on both sets.
Both sets are closed-captioned, and every episode runs
approximately 25 minutes and 30 seconds. There are
chapters inserted at all of the appropriate places The
following subsections get into the specifics of the
audio and video on each set.

Video and Audio Quality (Original Black and White):

The first two seasons of Bewitched were filmed in black and white.
The episodes were remastered in high definition for this set. Overall,
they look very good and I was pleased with the video quality.
There is some grain on the picture, which is probably more evident
in the black and white versions. There are 9 episodes on each disc,
so I feel they could have spread them out a bit more. There
were no major compression issues even with that many episodes
per disc. All episodes appear to be unedited with
running times over 25 minutes. The audio track is pretty good, in Dolby Digital mono.
There are no major problems, and the volume is at a good level.
The black and white version includes closed captioning, but
no other language tracks like the colorized set.

Video and Audio Quality (In Color):

There are no major concerns here. In fact, I was very
impressed by how clean the video on this set was, and
the audio quality, while not the most impressive thing
I've ever heard, was a lot better than just adequate.
There is a little bit of grain on the picture (what
would you expect for a show that is over 40 years
old?), but other than that, I didn't see any problems
with the video. One tidbit fans might notice, both
sets have the 1966 opening credits, like in
syndication. So we see the third season opening
sequence, rather than the first season. Expect that
for the second season as well, though, I hope I’m
wrong.

The colorized episodes give viewers a whole new way to
view the first season. These DVDs were my first
experience with viewing the colorized episodes, and
much to my surprise; I was impressed by how these
episodes looked. Everybody remembers the colorization
of various television shows and movies from the past,
where nothing looked natural and the colorization was
bad enough to make the movie or program unwatchable.
However, Sony has done a great job of the colorization
on this set, and I would be tempted to say that the
episodes look EXACTLY like the later seasons of
Bewitched, which were originally in color anyway.
There are a few problems with the colorization, but
they are really only related to the issue of hair
color. The color of the hair of the characters seems a
LITTLE bit different than the color from the color
episodes, but in most cases it is barely noticeable.
The biggest problem is the fact Larry Tate's hair
appears to be much grayer than it ever seemed in the
color episodes. I found myself enjoying the episodes
more in color than I did in black and white, which was
surprising to me.

The colorized set includes English, Spanish, and
Portuguese audio, as well as Spanish, Portuguese,
Chinese, and Thai subtitles. Although there are no
English subtitles, the set is still closed-captioned,
just as the black and white set is. The audio quality
on the Spanish and Portuguese audio tracks (for those
that may be interested) is horrible to say the least.
The audio sounds like it is coming through a pay
telephone, the voices sound nothing like the actual
actors, and most music and laugh tracks are missing
from these audio tracks.
Fortunately, for the majority of the people that
purchase this set, the English audio quality is fairly
decent, in Dolby Digital mono.

Special Features:

The set isn't exactly loaded with special features,
but there are some special features, including some
interviews. Disc 1 contains The Magic Unveiled Part
One (7:30) and Disc 2 contains The Magic Unveiled Part
Two (8:08). Both of these are interviews with people
associated with the show, including William Asher
(director/producer), Erin Murphy (Tabitha), Herbie
Pilato (author of "Bewitched Forever"), Kasey Rogers
(Louise Tate in the later seasons), Sol Saks
(creator), and Mark Wood (author of "The Bewitched
Cookbook: Magic in the Kitchen"). The interviews were
kind of interesting, but in all honesty, there really
isn't much in the interviews that the average
Bewitched fan doesn't already know. Basically, they
just discuss the show and the actors on the show.
There is a little bit of interesting stuff on there
about some of the special effects, and it would have
been interesting if they would have said more about
them. Disc Two contains "Magic and Mishaps" (7:55),
which is basically just a bunch of clips from the
first season where a narrator shows where technical
errors were made in the show, somewhat like those old
Classic TV Rewinds that Nick at Nite used to air. I
was expecting some unseen outtakes, but that is not
what was there. In order to add some length to this
there are also some other clips that feature the guest
stars from various episodes in the first season. Disc
4 contains previews for the Bewitched movie (2:31),
The Partridge Family DVD set (1:02), The Brooke
Ellison Story (1:50), and D.E.B.S. (1:56). The special
features are exactly the same on both sets. Since the
special features include actual footage from the show,
it is important to note that regardless of which set
you purchase, both of them have black and white
footage in the special features. One special feature
that would have been VERY nice to see is the original
opening credits--complete with sponsor information
would have been even nicer.

Final Comments:

Sony has a reputation for being economical when
putting out DVD sets, but they did a fairly good job
with this set. As a bonus for fan that purchase this
set while the movie Bewitched is in theaters, there is
even a free ticket to see the Bewitched film included
in this set. The special features on this set are
decent, but giving consumers a choice between original
black and white or colorized is a very good move, and
other companies should consider this as well. So for
the purists, there is the black and white
set--released in the way that the show was originally
made. For those that just want to enjoy the show
without worrying about what is natural and not
natural, there is the colorized set. And for those
that are in between, then there is ALWAYS that option
to purchase the color set and turn the color off on
your television. I did that myself for one of the
episodes, and although the shades of black and white
were probably not PRECISELY the same as they are on
the black and white set, this option is always
available to those that purchase the colorized set.
Obviously, you can turn off the color on the colorized
set, but you can't just "turn on" the color on the
black and white set. Regardless of what your tastes
are, you won't want to miss picking up this set.